Since 1960, several mother-child intervention programs with low income families have been initiated. Evaluations of the parent education programs have been characterized by an absence of a theoretical rationale for the effects of the process of intervention which considers community life styles, parental value orientations and teaching styles, and children's behaviors. The research, therefore, has given: (1) insufficient attention to the natural teaching styles of mothers; (2) an overemphasis to the results of direct stimulation of the child, frequently paralleled by corresponding neglect of effects on maternal personality; (3) limited simultaneous attention to the relative merits of comparative approaches to parent education for changes in maternal and child behaviors. This research investigates the effects of two different parent education programs in three low-income black communities (housing projects in Chicago area) on mother-child interaction patterns and the preschool children's cognitive and personal social development. A guiding assumption is that the programs focus upon modernization of maternal and child behaviors, relative to the traditional patterns of interaction already existent within this community. One parent education program emphasizes maternal development through discussion groups; another emphasizes development through personalized services directed to individual mother-child dyads at home. The principal hypothesis is that changes in the behavioral outcomes will be accompanied by changes in maternal value orientations toward modernization of child-rearing beliefs and practices.